Home | Footstool Frenzy

This week Chris and I enjoyed the bank holiday off, right in the middle of the week. It was such a beautiful day, we had a few things that we needed to do outside so thought we would take advantage of the sunshine.

The basis for this project was this wooden palette. I thought I would try and making a fabric footstool for our living room. Chris and I did it together and this is definitely a 2 person job!

Materials you’ll need:

Wooden palette: whatever size you want your footstool to be. I got mine from work but you can find them just about anywhere.

Legs: I chose the gold caster legs to match my sofa…and my new sofa which I’m ordering soon. I bought this from eBay but you could get legs just about anywhere.

5cm thick foam: to fit the size of the surface area of the footstool…I used several thinner pieces but the thicker piece is definitely better as I used more than I expected, it worked out more expensive and took much more time.

2cm thick foam: to fit the surface area and around the side of the footstool with enough to be stapled underneath

Fabric: a little bit extra then the 2cm thick foam to cover the buttons

Push together buttons

Tools you’ll need:

Drill

Saw

Hammer

Staple gun & staples (lots of staples)

Long upholstery needle

Thick thread

How to:

Once you have found a wooden palette that’s the right size or cut it to the correct size, work out how many buttons you will want and the distance they should be. I chose to put a row in each of the pieces of wood. I measured out and drilled a hole while they should be placed. You may not want buttons in yours, and if not you’ll save about half the time in making this. Make sure that you give the palette a brush down now before it’s covered.

Place the 5cm foam on top (where you have drilled holes) and staple, as close to the bottom of it as possible, the entire circumference of the wooden palette to ensure it stays in place.

Lay the 2cm foam on the ground and flip wooden palette rover so the 5cm foam is laid down on the thinner foam then pull it really tight and staple to the bottom.

Do the same process for the fabric making sure it’s pulled really tight and lots of staples are added around the base. Once the fabric is added cut off any excess and use this excess to cover the buttons. This can take a bit of time depending on the number of buttons you have. Mine were by no means perfect but once they were in the fabric on the stool I didn’t notice.

Add the buttons by threading through the holes you have drilled. Make sure you have an extra long needle to make sure it passes easily through the foam. Leave about half of the thick thread on the sewing side so you can tie the tread on the underside. Once you have threaded the button, tie the two ends and make a large knot. Pull the thread tight and staple down. This creates the dimples in the cushion.

Add the legs and you’re done! Test it out before anyone sits on it to make sure the legs are secure…

It didn’t take us as long as I thought it would. It’s probably one of our most successful DIY projects we have completed to date. It was not expensive to complete, definitely much cheaper than buying. My friend Lindsey has put her order in for use to make one for apartment. I’m delighted with the result and hope you give it a go.

Nothing left for us to do than to put our feet up on our new footstool relishing in our efforts while thoroughly enjoy this beautiful Sunday.